


The Spanish Moss Motel

by twofoldAxiom



Series: Music To Exorcise To [2]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Age Difference, Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Anal Sex, Bad Jokes, Biting, Blasphemy, Blood and Gore, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Corpses, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dead People, Demon Deals, Demon Hunters, Demon/Human Relationships, Demonic Possession, Demons, Derogatory Language, Explicit Language, Graphic Description, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mentioned Donald Trump, Nicki Minaj Songs, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Violence, Penis In Vagina Sex, Racism, Racist Language, Road Trips, Rough Sex, Scarification, Shower Sex, Tail Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:21:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26165560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twofoldAxiom/pseuds/twofoldAxiom
Summary: It's been a few days on the road with Karkat Vantas, the demon who assaulted Dave Strider in his car in the middle of nowhere. A few things have settled and a few things still need addressing, but as it is, they need a quick stop to recharge their batteries.Secluded, mostly-abandoned, and blessedly lacking in actual roaches, the Spanish Moss Motel is just the place! WiFi and breakfast cost extra.
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas
Series: Music To Exorcise To [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1900105
Comments: 4
Kudos: 71





	The Spanish Moss Motel

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Essynkardi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Essynkardi/gifts).



> I can't believe how long it's taken me to get around to writing this. It's also shorter than I wanted it to be, but I couldn't figure out anywhere else to take it that wouldn't feel way too long, so this was as good a place as I could find to stop.
> 
> Anyway, dedicated to Essynkardi, who helped me write the original iterations of these characters anyway. Hope you enjoy! 
> 
> CW Tags, not contained in the above tag cloud for organization purposes:  
> Pedophilia References  
> Necrophilia References  
> IRL Racism
> 
> Please mind the above tags; Donald Trump is only mentioned early on, the underage and necro stuff is in reference to Karkat's age when he died (and a couple VERY off-color jokes by Dave), and the racist joke gets called out in-fic, but that's still kind of a moodkiller for a lot of people. If any of the above will be a problem for you, please don't read the fic.
> 
> If anything else needs to be tagged, please tell me!
> 
> EDIT December 11, 2020:  
> Did a couple retcons to references references to Hell, as later stories will contradict how demons work in that regard. Instead, demons are made at the point of death due to unfinished business, and rather than being banished to Hell, are banished to an unspecified metaphysical location before "respawning" to cause trouble. Also removed a reference to wards, as I decided wards don't affect all demons the same depending on their beliefs in life.

This map is bullshit.

You don't know if it's just because you're so used to being somewhere that google maps can reach you, or if it's because every small town barely worth its map space you pass through is pretty much the same vaguely racist nowhere as all the rest, or because you've counted more abandoned gas stations than inhabited _anything_ on this particular stretch of lonely, seemingly endless road, but you're going batshit.

You could swear you should have seen some sign of actual civilization by now, like a proper suburb, or a distant city, or really, _anything but all this brownish grey bounty of diddly-fucking-squat._

Rain speckles the windshield. Wind rattles the bare-branched trees. A lesser man might've found this emptiness eerie, and Hell, maybe you do, especially knowing what you know about things that lurk in the dark. It's just that right now you're a little too busy squinting at the map and trying to match it up to what's in front of you.

You're just lucky you don't have to do this alone, though maybe the fact that you're travelling with someone who _is_ what lurks in the dark is a little less than ideal.

Your name is Dave Strider and as far as awkward, uncomfortable car rides go... actually this isn't even close to the worst one up there, but "Anaconda" by Nicki Minaj is playing quietly over the radio and that does lend a kind of surreal, slightly shitty quality to everything. How old is this song by now? You'd check but with your luck you'll look down just long enough to ram dick-first into a semi. The road's empty, but you kind of just expect a semi to spontaneously manifest a split second after you look down.

Sighing, you shift your focus to a distant spot right up ahead that might be a swirl of fog or a puddle or some roadkill, and consider whether or not you want to make conversation with the demon napping peacefully beside you.

_My anaconda don't- my anaconda don't- my anaconda don't want none-_

You tune the radio to meaningless static and sigh. The fuzzy crackle at least blends into the sound of rain, but you've never been very good at keeping quiet for long.

"So." You start, glancing at Karkat through the corner of your eye. You think you can still see grey creeping up the sides of his face, and splatters of bright red that could be blood. "Remind me why you looked more like a xenomorph last week and now you're my little cousin Rodriguez that I'm definitely not kidnapping?"

Cousin Rodriguez, as in Karkat, as in the literal demonic entity who last you checked is about as Mexican as Donald Trump, cracks an eye open to glare at you from where he's leaning his head on the passenger-side window. The eye itself is completely red, iris the color of arterial spray and scleras just a bit darker. He yawns and wipes drool off the corner of his mouth.

"First off." He starts, though he has to stop to stifle another yawn. When he opens his eyes again they're normal, you know, aside from the eyebags you could smuggle a body in. "I told you to stop with the nicknames, you white bread piece of shit; there's only so far my patience will extend to accommodate jokes that were never funny, and you're looking at the wrong landmass if you're trying to poke fun at when I was alive."

"Uh-huh." The rain's stopped, right? You think it's stopped.

"Second off, much as I'd prefer to keep that form over my original one, I was _asleep_ and it's at least easier to keep up the guise of Cousin Ezekiel hitching a ride while I'm asleep than trying to make myself look like I'm actually related to you." He pulls his hoodie down over his eyes even though it's like ninety degrees out or some shit. "I'd explain more but while your dick's recovering, I've got energy to conserve. Find a way to entertain yourself if you're not going to feed me."

"I don't know about you but I think I'd be more comfortable getting my dick sucked by an alien than a thoroughly stoned tenth grader. I already get told I look like I sell drugs for sexual favors on playgrounds, man, don't gotta get people outright _convinced_." You snort, but the memory of him sucking your cock _does_ make you want to cross your legs a little, out of fear and arousal. He makes a noise that you're pretty sure is "I don't care", muffled in the back of his mouth as he leans his head back against the headrest with his eyes closed. 

"Too bad I already sucked your dick and then some." He mutters. "So it's a little late on that front."

It takes another few moments of silence and the return of Nicki Minaj's weird, annoying laugh on the radio before the full force of his statement hits you.

"Wait..." Your brain stutters like a scratched record. "You're a tenth grader?"

"Fuckin-" He makes this horrible gargling noise, like he was going to laugh but decided it wasn't insulting enough. "I’m sure even you were a tenth grader at some nebulous point in the distant past."

"It wasn't that nebulous, _I_ was a tenth-grader in the early two-thousands. But hey, let's back up a fucking second here; were you going to tell me I'd been banging a dead fifteen year old this entire time or was that something I was kind of supposed to figure out for myself?" Out of the corner of your eye you can see him opening his eyes to stare heavenward, or something like that, you're not sure if he's actually begging an unseen God for mercy or answers regarding your stupidity, or if it's just a leftover habit from, well, not that long ago apparently.

"What, like that's supposed to be an important detail?" He grunts and turns in his seat. "Did you forget in the short amount of time between seeing my preferred form and my current form that I'm a _demon?_ You know, like how by some definitions I'm both dead and not even human?"

That gets a snort out of you. "You make it kind of hard to forget."

"Exactly. So we can pretend you're a necrophile, or we can do the sensible thing and consider that I've been around much longer than fifteen years." You feel something tighten around your throat. There's nothing there when you look in the mirror, but it coils tighter, warm and alive, forcing you to keep your head turned towards the road. 

"And of course, let's not pretend _I'm_ the victim here."

Karkat grins and you feel your aching dick sitting heavy in your lap. 

You gulp, feeling the sinuous muscle of his tail tensing across your throat before it dissipates into nothing. Good timing, too, because you were about to miss the shady motel that practically materialized in the rear-view mirror. Definitely an improvement over a spontaneous semi-truck coming at you at Mach Fuck-You. 

You turn the car around and sigh. This place couldn't have come at a better time, because dear God do you need a shower and maybe to take a piss in a proper bathroom instead of a thoroughly abused bottle of what had once been Blue Bolt Gatorade, and as much as Karkat complains about it maybe you want to adjust your pants instead of getting the life sucked out of you for the third time today.

Now that the rain's stopped, you make sure to roll down your window a couple inches so you aren't blasted with hot air as soon as you open the door when you come back later, assuming it's hot and not frozen solid because fuck American weather these days. Also, what do you know, this place has wifi. Your phone picks up a couple network names with two or three bars each.

Small miracles.

Gentleman that you are, you turn to Karkat to help him out, but you don't even get the words out because he's already gone. The door is swinging closed and Karkat himself is out of sight. Guess demons need to piss, too.

Or, well, shit, maybe not, but you don't have any better explanations forthcoming. As far as you know, he doesn't teleport, or he'd probably have just done that to get to LA instead of hitching a ride with you. At least while he's taking a leak you can figure out how you're going to pay for a two-person room, or make up a more believable reason than "cousin I'm taking to visit family a couple states over, on my mother's side, honest" to have him around in the first place. 

Granted, this doesn't look like the type of place where anyone would give you shit about whatever reasons you'd have for coming here, at least as long as you don't leave permanent stains. There's a dark miasma of Dead End Americana choking the air, right down to the stained neon sign and used condoms in murky puddles. You're going to want to keep your keys like in your underwear or something if you don't want to be stranded, though a sufficiently desperate or determined car thief probably won't be stopped by that method. Would a place like this have car thieves? Maybe a place like this probably wouldn't have car thieves, unless it's actually manned by some liminal space backwoods cannibals intent on luring people like you for food-

You're reminded that you're standing in the summery, swampy heat of day when a drop of sweat drips right into your eye and you, like an idiot, slap yourself in the face as if that's going to stop anything. The tears at least help wash out the sweat gunk, though now there's a handprint smeared into your shades. You shake your head in a daze and make a face when you realize what you just did, and yeah, okay, you're done standing here like an idiot and having monologues, time to see if this place is or is not run by the souls of the damned.

That'd be pretty funny. Maybe Karkat's catching up with some of them in the thin membrane between this world and the next.

Kinda fucked up that you think that's funny. 

The sign above reads "Spanish Moss Motel". You wonder if when night falls it'll have amusingly-placed missing letters, like, Ass Motel, or at least Spam Motel.

~!~

The reception area looks like the literary ideal of shitty motel reception areas, as if you've walked through the thin bubble of reality and into humanity's collective idea of what a shitty motel's reception area should look like. There's a dusty plastic plant in the corner that looks simultaneously fake-alive and wilting, the couches look like cutouts from a magazine about the Seventies, and the carpet has mysterious stains behind the furniture that you don't want to consider too hard.

Still, it's airconditioned, and you can feel the sweat evaporate off of you when you enter. A little chime rings over the door as it swings closed. There's a crackly old TV playing some generic soap opera above the counter, and with her back to you is a little old lady snoozing next to a boxy thing that might charitably be called a computer if it was still the year 2008.

You wipe your hands on your jeans and check your watch, wipe your shades clean on the least sticky part of your shirt, and ding the little bell on the counter. She doesn't even twitch. She barely looks like she's breathing. 

Wait, no, hold that thought. 

She _isn't_ breathing.

"Uh."

You look around and sniff. Yeah, she's definitely dead, if the vaguely vomit-y smell lingering underneath the scent of cheap strawberry aerosol is anything to go by. Is there anyone else here? You ding the bell again and check your phone, considering whether or not to call 911 and hopefully a relative or something. The air feels damp and moldy in a way it didn't a moment ago, though you're probably just noticing that because of the _literal dead body-_

She gasps, wheezing and throwing her head back, gibbering and just about scaring the piss out of you. Not literally, because in this line of work you need to develop some pretty good bladder control, but it's still got you reaching for your gun and a bottle of blessed water.

You back up all the way to the door, keeping your back to the warm glass as her neck cracks and she tilts her head this way and that like someone wiggling into a brand new body stocking.

You know, made of old-lady skin, as one does.

"Christ almighty." You mutter, less for its protective properties and more out of disgust.

 _It's nice that you think to pray, but a brother should be aware of his audience._ It echoes in your head, several voices at once layered on top of each other until they muddle together into one. The thing wearing her body cracks its neck one more time and levels its gaze with you, eyes glowing, purple, and completely lifeless.

She looks between your gun and then your face. Distantly, you hear those several different voices laughing.

_You think a gun will save a motherfucker when he's this far beyond the reaches of the Almighty?_

It vaults the counter as you fire, stumbling back and instinctively holding an arm in front of your face. You kind of wish you'd said something clever, hearing a shriek and a thud as the bullet explodes on contact.

Bro was a lot of things, but at least he taught you how to bless a bullet.

It hisses as the smoke scorches its face, clawing at poor grandma's eyes in agony; you can hear the wet noises of it choking on the smoke while you reach for the door and try to wrench it open.

Just your luck that you didn't bring the banishing salt this time around. You give up on the doorknob and shatter the glass with the handle of your gun, thankful your jacket saves you from being torn up by the shards as you-

_Bitch,_

It screeches in your mind as it tackles you, glass scraping across your sleeve. It's like being tackled by a gorilla, knocking most of the breath from your lungs while you flail under what feels like three little old ladies in one. Demonic essence oozes between your fingers as you try to push her away, as you try to pry her iron grip off your neck. _Hold the motherfuck still so I can eat you._

You get your knees under her and _shove_ , throwing her over your head. Something breaks and you don't check what. Your gun clicks uselessly when you try to shoot again. 

_Fuck_ these stupid six-bullet pieces of shit when you forget to reload, except not really because it's all that's between you and granny's brand new claws when she lunges for you again. You've still got the holy water and she screams- with her mouth this time- as you squirt some at her and kick her through the hole in the door, right into the business end of Karkat's tail. 

She looks down at the long, sickle-like blade of it, sticking out through her chest like a railroad spike, soaked in purple ichor. You know that won't be enough to finish her off, you get ready to throw more holy water on there (as carefully as you can manage so as not to get any on Karkat) when his tail whips to the side with such force that it tears itself out and rips granny in half.

There's a moment of shocked silence, as she stares at where her lower half had been. So do you, actually, dripping holy water onto the floor.

You, uh. Didn't know succubi could do that.

Your boner chafes painfully against the inside of your pants.

He shoves the door open, livid and kind of terrifying in fully demonic form. Even when he's furious there's something sensual about it, the way his hips sway as he kicks aside granny's still-twitching lower half and impales her on his tail again. He looks at you with something on the border of anger, maybe, but when he speaks his voice is in the same sultry, lilting tone he used when you first met.

"Did this idiot here just try to eat you? You'd think _some people,_ " The blade of his tail _twists_ , and you flinch in sympathetic pain. "Would learn to recognize when they've just stuck their filthy mitts in _someone else's dinner_."

He doesn't take his eyes off her as he speaks, not while her upper body, still squirming, claws at his tail. You swallow, mouth dry, shaking yourself. Eyes rolling, the pinned demon finally gives up on trying to wrench out Karkat's tail. She doesn't speak- maybe she doesn't need to speak, out loud- but Karkat responds with a furious grimace and another vicious twist.

" _Yes_ he's mine, you thieving piece of shit; do you try to cram _every_ unlucky fuck you find on your way to the living into that gaping fuckhole you call a mouth?" A beat. You could swear Karkat looks even _more_ offended now, his voice going rough around the edges again. "Oh, don't even go there!"

It'd be funny if it wasn't downright horrifying. Sucks for whoever gets the news that grandma isn't coming to her own funeral.

Karkat wrenches his tail back out with a kind of wet, sucking noise, flicking purple ooze off his tail. He looks to you, ignoring the bisected demon still just lying there making a mess of the carpet. The air ripples around him and he's somewhere between his human and demon forms, at least, or like he's wearing pants and shoes and is half a head shorter than you. Doesn't make you feel much better, that's for sure.

His expression softens, disarmingly. He picks up your bloodied hand and plucks a splinter of glass out of your thumb with a pair of claws. "Felt something shunt me out of the car as soon as we got here. Took me a minute to find a way in; this moron here set up a barrier for other demons. You alright?"

Grandma hisses. Karkat's tail twitches threateningly.

"I'm fine." You gulp, smiling weakly. It just comes out of you without you really thinking about it. "A little scraped but, hey, teaches me to take aim, right?"

"For a start, yeah. Don't know how you've managed to make it this far without me." And back to normal Karkat. He walks behind the counter and plucks a key off the rack, holding up the number on the key ring for you and tossing you the spare. "I'll hide in one of the rooms until you come get me. Tell the cops you did that." He says, pointing at the now-putrefying pile of what had once been a demon.

You sigh and run a hand through your hair as Karkat leaves to find the rooms. Once he's gone, you squirt holy water on the bisected remains until there's nothing left but inky stains in the carpet. 

Now comes the hard part.

~!~

It's way past nightfall by the time you head over to the room Karkat chose. Frankly, calling the cops and explaining what just happened is always the worst part of the job, but at least in places like this that means you get a little compensation for freelancing if you've got proof of possession, which a chalk circle and a bit of burnt hair was ready to provide. 

Bless superstitious little nowhere towns.

Paid and fed your traditional fees (gas money, a couple sandwiches, a generous tip from a grateful family member), the tiredness sinks into your bones like cement. You've brought some of your warding supplies out of the car, so anything that isn't already in the room won't be getting in, and anything that's already in there will probably just get its shit packed in by Karkat apparently.

The water that come out of the shower is rusty brown at first (ew) but once it's clear it's pleasantly warm, and you step under the weak spray with a sigh. You've got like two sachets of body wash and one of shampoo in the little soap alcove, so you squirt one onto a face towel and do your best to get the worst of the stank out of your crack and from under your arms.

You make the mistake of sniffing the washcloth, wince, and run it under the water with a little more soap before scrubbing a second time. Christ, you don't want to know what else Karkat's been eating if he could go down on _you._

Also, because you're a simple man and you've been thinking about it, you measure up your dick against your hand. You've checked a few times in the past few days, but, damn. It's like three inches past the tips of your fingers. You can hardly believe it, and you've got your hand right on there.

You hear the door open, the shower curtains being pushed aside, and Karkat joins you under the spray without so much as a hello before reaching around and pushing your hands away from your cock. You hiss as he closes his fist over it, burying his face between your shoulderblades and pumping your dick achingly slow.

"F-fuck, _Karkat-_ " You tilt your head back, water getting in your eyes, but you don't get to say much more before his other hand is prying your jaw open, fingers dipping into your mouth. He catches your tongue and you lick and suck eagerly, your mind blissfully blank while he strokes your cock.

"You should know you take forever in the shower. I was about ready to go looking for someone else to fuck, but it doesn't look like there's anyone here worth my time within walking distnace after all." He grumbles, nuzzling into your back, his chest pressed against you now. You feel his tail snaking its way up your ankle, the blade gone blunt and fleshy and honestly it feels more like a cock on the end of a tentacle right now, and you're pretty sure he's gonna be putting that inside you because he just took his fingers out of your mouth. 

"Uh-" You gulp, and then moan, your mind going fuzzy and your mouth gaping like a fish as he works a spit-slick finger into your ass. Is he using magic on you? Probably, but it feels good, so you don't put up a fight as he pushes a second one in, even though the stretch makes you suck breath through your nose and nearly gets water up there too. " _Fuck,_ dude, I was trying to get clean in here."

His tail wraps tighter around your thighs as he strokes your cock harder, making you wobble slightly. Was he going easy on you when you met? The thought is kind of unsettling, and hot as Hell, and you wouldn't be all that surprised after the violent display from earlier. The thought of it makes you moan again, and you feel him smile against your skin, and the sharp points of his claws as he shifts further into demonic form.

"Don't fucking stop," You gasp as he gets his fingers out of you, as a thumb claw threatens the delicate skin of your cock. It should be the least sexy thing _ever_ to have those talons so close to something so delicate, but you're shaking, trying to hump into his grip.

He stops touching you all at once and you groan, pressing your forehead to the tile. That _has_ to be on purpose. "Thought you were so hungry you couldn't wait for me to get out of the bath?"

"That was just to take the edge off." Is that a fucking pun? You'd laugh but you're still frustrated, waiting for him to touch you again. You reach down to take care of it yourself, but he grabs your wrists and pins them to your sides, growling in your ear. "I was giving you the time to get clean like you wanted, asshole."

"Pffft." You turn around, facing him properly, and you kind of wish you weren't completely naked so you could look over your shades at him; it's nice to know he's shorter than you even when in sexy xenomorph shape, at least, and he has to look up at you as you crowd him against the wall, away from the water. "Do I look like I'm serving Michelin stars over here? Besides, your tail's still trying to shove its way into my ass."

It's true; you feel his tail between your thighs, the smooth warmth of it against your balls and the blunt, heavy end prodding meaningfully at your left buttcheek. He grins at you, predatory and chilling with those wicked-looking teeth, and leans up until he's breathing your air.

"Then get fucked, Strider."

You feel a wave of sudden heat in the pit of your gut, the warmth of his lips on yours, the sudden, aching pressure of his tail pushing into you; luckily, magic demon bullshit, so there's some kind of oily lubricant on the skin smoothing the way. Your knees quiver as you shout in surprise and pleasure and you practically fall against him, crushing him against the wall. His tail pulls back and then _surges_ into you, undulating and oily-wet, wetter than it was a second ago, pressing up against something inside you that makes your cock twitch from the inside-out. You groan into his lips, broken and needy.

"K-Karkat-!"

He shoves his tongue into your mouth, fucking your throat with it. You think you hear him moan, and then you feel the clutching heat of his cunt at the tip of your cock and you're not really ready to think about much else for the moment. When his tail next pushes into you, you rock into him with it, feeling him gasp and shudder against the wall as he takes every inch of your cock in one go. If your knees were weak before, you're pretty sure it's just his tail keeping you up now.

God, how much of his tail is even in you right now? It feels like he's got a whole arm in there, and yet it doesn't hurt at all; if anything, that feeling of impossible fullness turns you on like a trained response, like you'd practiced for it and he's putting it to good use. That you've only known him a couple weeks at most doesn't factor in, you're molded to him like he's crushed you into the spaces between his teeth. 

You suck on his tongue and try to tangle it with your own, your hands running up and down his sides, grabbing the curve of his ass, his thigh where it's hooked over your hip, just running your hands over smooth, supple skin. Claws graze down your arms as he rolls his hips down and sparks curl up and down your spine. When he grabs your hair and mashes your mouths together harder, his tentacock curling down around your balls while his tail does this corkscrewy thing inside you, you _whimper_. 

"F-fuck, _please,_ " You don't really know how to feel about begging in this moment but you sure as Hell know you want more of his _everything_ right just now. You muffle a moan into his mouth and feel him smile, the points of his teeth grazing your skin.

"Please what?" He teases, and before you can answer he pulls your head back by the hair, kissing down your neck. His tail coils as he rolls his hips down and your knees nearly buckle again. The floor is slippery with soap and mixed fluids and it's probably really dangerous to be doing this in here, but you don't _care,_ you're just so _close_.

His claws prickle at your scalp, his tail so far inside you that it feels like it's going to come up the back of your throat. Is that physically possible? Probably not. The idea's hot, though, in a freakish, terrifying sort of way, much like a lot of other things about him.

He shakes your head, still waiting for an answer. He _growls_. You know what you want.

"Fucking- _bite me, please._ "

You think, out of the corner of your eye, he looks a little surprised. You'd laugh if you weren't overwhelmed and strung between his hands and his tail and the sweltering heat of his cunt like a piece of sexed-up taffy. You roll your hips up into him one last time, and he grunts, shivering around you. You feel his lips on your shoulder.

You feel teeth, and sharp, bright pain that makes you _snap_. All the tension in your body focuses there, in the bite and in your dick, and you _scream_ as you cum so hard you finally slip and fall.

Karkat swears, sharply. You probably bumped something on the way down.

Not that you're aware of much as you quiver in a boneless, post-orgasm heap. It feels like about a minute of that nonsense before you start coming back to yourself, in shuddery bits and pieces, and the first thing you notice is that the water is running a little harder, and a little colder. Karkat strokes your hair. The satisfied way he purrs against you vibrates into your ribs like an oversized motor, or maybe a large, heavy cat; his tail is curled loosely across the shower floor.

You're on the floor, curled up in the corner of the shower with him. The tile is slick and cold under your sore ass- which _is_ getting sore now that demon magic isn't distracting you from it- and you watch as little smears of blood from your scratches and bites cum from your monstrous orgasm swirl down the drain. God. Your ears are ringing from how hard you fucking came. You're still hard.

You're still hard? You're still hard. Karkat opens his eyes, irises red as arterial spray and faintly luminescent with fresh magic. He licks his lips as one hand cups the still miraculously stiff pole between your legs. You groan.

Exhaustion and dull, raw pain seems to radiate out from every part of your body, even a few you hadn't been aware of before this moment. His fingers are softer than any human's and it's still too much. You didn't think you'd reach a point in your life where you were having _too much_ sex.

"We're doing this again?" You sigh, wincing as his tongue flicks over the oversensitive head.

"I _do_ need a steady supply of magic, and I don't exactly have an abundance of crackheads in here to take it from." Karkat pouts at you, lips glossy with spit and precum, but the effect is somewhat ruined by the way his eyes still smile. You feel a sudden pang of jealousy at the thought of him going at it with someone he finds wherever it is he finds people, even though logically you know he _should,_ more for your sake than his. "Besides, you're still hard; don't you want me to take care of that?"

"I'm only hard because of bullshit succubus magic, don't try that on me." You snort. Still, the way his hands glide down your cock makes your toes curl. You want him _bad._ "Isn't there something I can do for you while my dick recovers? Maybe on a bed, where we're not getting wrinkly and cold?"

You're not sure what that look on his face is. Pensive, maybe, or pained in that way some ghosts get when you remind them of the living. You feel like a jerk for it and you don't even know why he's looking at you like that; it makes you miss the sultry, sadistic succubus front a little, if only because you know he's _happy_ or at least _pleased_ when he's like that.

(It strikes you, for a second, that this line of thought is just... Why do you care? You're a meal and a ride to him. Less, once you reach LA.)

That doesn't sit right with you, though. You cough.

"Hey, uh, I'm serious; I don't know what you might get out of it but I _can_ , you know... " But he stops you, a finger on your lips. You feel your dick twitch again, worryingly.

"I've got some ideas- you can thank me later- that involve shutting you up with my dick. But you'll have to behave if you want that, alright?" He says, and then pulls his hand away. He stands and stretches before he steps out of the shower, taking one of the towels off the rack and drying himself off. The towel gets dropped to the floor as he shakes out his damp, fluffy hair, stray droplets flying off with the movement.

"You gonna be okay finishing up in here?"

You look back at his face, eerily human and terrifyingly not. For a second his expression leans into tender and even concerned, before he looks away from you and heads back out the door. You hear the crackly sound of a tv switching on and channels being surfed, and then the creak of bedsprings being pushed down.

Knowing he _was_ human... somehow makes everything about him a lot more tragic. You wonder how he ended up a demon. You never did understand the theory behind demons; that some of them used to be people and most never were, or most just forgot they were people from however long they've been monsters. 

Do they have a choice? It always felt so detached from you until you started on this roadtrip.

"I'll finish up just fine." You say, to nobody in particular. You've got probably a pretty long while before you actually end up in Los Angeles with the kind of money you get from demon hunting and the deal you made with Karkat. You don't really know how long it'll actually take, but you know any estimates you make are gonna go right out the window.

~!~

Hours after your shower and more sex (wherein you got choked out on demon dick a couple times and you're pretty sure Karkat kept riding _your_ dick even after you passed out), you wake up in the bed, tangled into the sheets, with a mouth so dry you could polish stone with your tongue. The TV's still on, playing a muted ad that from what you can gather is somewhere between a formal exorcism service and a cult. 

Karkat sleeps beside you, and you think, he looks peaceful like this. Normal. Like he could just be some guy that you hooked up with. You think back on the leering monster you met that first night and shake your head.

Springs creak under you as you slide off the bed, squeaking like rusty hinges as the mattress bounces back into place. Miraculously, Karkat doesn't wake up.

Amazingly, you still have enough moisture left in your body to take a piss, so you head into the bathroom to do just that.

You wash your hands and look at yourself in the cracked, faded mirror, and you wonder when you got to looking so worn out yourself. Could be the lack of sleep you guess, or living in a literal car; your cheeks are hollow and your lips are pinched, and your eyebags could rival Karkat's. You look like you're falling apart at the seams, and there's a lot more seams than there should be. 

Claw marks. Burn marks. Sword marks. A detailed atlas of everything you've survived up to now, and the brand on your breastbone keeping your soul intact despite it all. You imagine Bro's muttering, and the feeling of a hot wire on your skin.

 _That one got too close._ The smell of antiseptics, the cloth between your teeth as you tried not to scream. Looking down at burn on your chest in a bathroom much like this one. _Don't hold back next time. They won't wait for you, either._

You lean your forehead on the mirror, breath misting the glass. Your hand still hurts from this morning, and you find yourself rubbing the wound.

Just a few more days to Los Angeles. You'll never see Karkat again.

**Author's Note:**

> [Shower scene fanart by lyricsfuckhouse on twitter](https://twitter.com/lyricsfuckhouse/status/1299608494249635840)


End file.
